PvP Boot Camp Season 2

Truff. lol

Quote:

Originally Posted by Smallzies Here's one for targetting: First target is always Philly Girl Make a chat bind that says "----->Target is Philly Girl<-----" If Philly Girl is ON your team, target her through broadcast so that the other team will spike her. Continue to call Philly Girl for the remaining 10 minutes, whether she is in the match or not. And that's all there is to it!

Siph-

You are certainly welcome to join any of the Kickballs we are running along side of the PvP classes, however, you probably wouldn't be able to actually join the event when we start forming up teams, this is really more of a training and informing type of event then an actual league.

Rad/psi is still great in PvP, TK is OP, animation times are no different between different animations of the same power. Psi/em is awesome. Sleep purple proc is still broken. PvP IO Procs seem to fire off a lot more then 33%. New incarnate powers really need to be removed from PvP.... ok you are all caught up, come play, and bring Pang.

I am out on the road for the next few days but will try to make the meeting tonight on my laptop if I can find the WiFi. Will be back in time for next week as normal.

Sounds good Just-

If you are not able to make it tonight do not sweat it man. I will type up what we are voting on and you can still cast your vote and such.

Had family stuff pop up so wont be here tonight, if traffic is good i might be able to make towards the end.

That was fun! I'm gonna try to do catch up sometime tomorrow for those that missed the class tonight.

Please contact @Smallzies; @Tritonfree; @Masque if you missed either of the last two weeks and would like to have one of us go over what we talked about.

The information we presented was the foundation of the skills you will be developing for PvP play. From here on out, you will actually start PvPing in a team setting against each other and soon we will be splitting up into teams and the real fun starts.

MP is offering help with some IOs and remember you should be rolling your tickets you get on the accelerated xp teams to roll bronze mid-level 30-34. Craft and sell the good recipes and you will have plenty of money to IO out your PvP toon. The Micro's in the travel power have really gone up in price, last I checked they were into the hundreds of millions so you can always switch them out for just straight up generic IOs or use BotZ travel/end and either quickfoot or springfoot run(jump)/end. For the two spots.

Also if your not in the global channel yet please contact one of us as well.

Going to try to do the last TF for this run tonight Numina 9pm est. Servers should be up at 7pm so baring any unforeseen issues i'll see anyone who needs it tonight.

I need it!

Going to run a make up session for those who have missed any meetings. This will be Friday at 8pm EST an hour prior to our normal meeting time. We will meet in pocket D.

Tomorrow I'll be starting TFC runs again with Posi pt1&2 they are also the WTF for this week. Usual 9pm EST meeting time.

Thanks again Philly for helping with all this stuff. I appreciate you taking the time to send out those tells tonight and also running all these tfs for people.

Hay everyone, I'm new in the PvP Boot camp, thank you all and especially Masque for inviting me, I don't have a lot of experience in PvP, but I have teamed with many of you on Victory for a long time in the PvE side, so I hope to learn a lot with all of you and have lots of fun. Thank you again

I should be running that in 2 weeks Kara. I'll probably go through them in order again. I'll remember to roke you if i see you on for that one.

I thought we were doing kills tonight?!

munkies!

Just a reminder the follow is our schedule for the next three weeks:

Week5: May 13th
Evaluation
Players new to PvP will run a mid-level kickball event under the leadership and guidance of Vet PvPers/Scouting Committee/Check off Committee. The new PvPers will evaluated to see if specific players need further attention on the following : evasion, inspiration usage, locking, spiking and communication. In addition, the players will be ‘scouted’ as far as their general skill level on movement and PvP status to aid in creating fair and balanced teams.
Goals to reach prior to meeting: Level characters to 45. Meeting with team captains and balancing committee to start forming teams.

Week 6: May 20th
Evaluation II
All participants in Boot Camp2 will participate in a kickball event set to Heavy Weight. The vet PvPers will interact with the new PvPers and again players needing further attention and 1:1 mentoring will be noted. Players will again be scouted to help make teams fair and balanced.
Goals prior to next meeting: Level all characters to 50. Create teams.

Week 7: May 27th
No Boot Camp- Memorial Day break.



Also we will start holding make up sessions prior to the meeting for anyone who has missed previous information. Almost all of it is posted on the forums though if you would rather read when you have time.

Looking forward to seeing you all tonight.

Masque and Philly Girl,

I just found out I have to travel today for work and will miss the PvP Boot Camp 2 session tonight. Sorry about the last minute notice. Please take good notes and I'll catch up with you all next week.

Thanks,

TB

I was asked by The_Masque to write a basic tutorial on Diminishing Returns for PvP designed to be useful to the Boot Camp. Unfortunately, there's no really easy way to explain or calculate DR in PvP, so while I tried to simplify as much as possible, even to understand the basics requires a crash course in game mechanics. Some of you might know this stuff, and some of you probably don't, so the article begins with some basic information on how the game actually calculates what powers do. If you know the difference between Cur and Abs, between Str and Res, and know how they work, you can probably skip that stuff, but the rules for PvP are embedded in that discussion (highlighted) so I would recommend skimming it regardless.

For those that want it, I include the formula for DR. For those that want to know what the DR values for a particular scenario will be but don't want to calculate them, I include a link to a google spreadsheet with all the DR values for all attributes that you can just plug numbers into. For those that don't even want to do that and just want some rules of thumb, I have tables at the end for some of the more common attributes PvPers are likely to be concerned about with ranges of values.

I'll try to monitor the thread for questions, but if anyone has a question and I fail to respond to the thread, you can always PM me and I'll try to respond when I can. And of course feedback on how to improve the guide in a way that would make it more useful to a general audience would be useful as well: if people think this would be useful outside of the Boot Camp, I'll consider tweaking it and posting it as a general guide.



First, some background. All entities in City of Heroes have properties called Attributes. These are things like melee defense, smashing (damage), endurance. Each attribute has a set of Aspects. These are things like its value, strength, and resistance associated with it. Its value is obvious. Strength refers to how strong the entity is when using powers that affect that attribute. So if your Smashing Strength is 1.5 (150%), any attack you use that deals smashing damage will hit 1.5x as hard as its base value. Resistance refers to how strong the entity resists anyone trying to change that attribute. So if you have 50% Smashing Resistance, anyone trying to deal smashing damage to you will have that damage reduced by 50%.

All powers have what the game calls Attribmods and players call "effects." Each power effect affects one attribute. When Build Up buffs "damage" it actually buffs the strength of all damage types: Smashing, Lethal, Fire, Cold, Energy, Negative, Toxic, and Psionic. It has eight separate individual effects each of which buffs the strength of one of those attributes (and one that buffs tohit).

When a power tries to change an actual value of an attribute, it has two basic ways to do that. It can do what is called a "Cur" change, and it can do an "Abs" change. "Cur" changes are relative percentage changes. When a power tries to change Endurance with a Cur -0.5, it is reducing the Endurance of that target by 50%. Abs changes are Absolute in points. When a power tries to change Endurance with an Abs -0.5, it is reducing the Endurance of that target by 0.5 *points*. Note the difference. Most damage is done in Abs: attacks deal a specific number of points of damage. Many debuffs of actual values are Cur: they deal a relative change.

There are other kinds of changes. Max changes buff the maximum a value can be. Dull Pain buffs the Max of health for example.

Rule Number One: PvP Diminishing Returns affects all Cur, Str, and Res effects. It does not affect Abs, or any other kinds of effects.


When a player uses a power, the game does this *for each attribmod the power has* (i.e. for each individual effect separately).

1. The game calculates all strength buffs and debuffs for the attribute in question.
2. If the attribmod allows strength mods, the game applies them to increase or reduce the effect.
3. If the attribmod is resistable, the game applies the appropriate resistance of the target to reduce (or increase) the effect.

Rule Number Two: PvP DR works on Cur, Str, and Res individually, but it only works on totals for each.


Example One:

You have +95% damage enhancement in an attack that does base 100 points of damage, and you have +80% damage buff from build up, the game totals them all up to get +175% damage. That is +1.75. It then applies DR to that value. For damage, that would be reduced to +1.28, or +128% damage. The attack is then magnified from its base damage to 2.28x normal, or 228 damage. That's an Abs, which is unaffected by DR, so that's the end: the attack does 228 damage.

Example Two:

A Scrapper has a defensive power that buffs melee defense by 10%. It is slotted with +56% enhancement, and you also have an invention bonus of +3% melee defense. The game needs to calculate the effect of the first power by calculating the effect of DR on its strength buffs. +56% or 0.56 is reduced to 0.51, and the power then does 10% * 1.51 = 15.1%. That is a Cur buff. The invention bonus adds +3% Cur buff for a total of 18.1% or 0.181. The *total* Cur buff on the Melee_Attack attribute is then the DR value of 0.181, or about 16%.

Example Three:

A Blaster has Health slotted with +95% enhancement, but is also under a -50% regeneration debuff. The strength buff is reduced from +95% to +80%. Health is a player self buff, and its a Cur. That makes the effect of Health +40% * 1.8, or +72% Cur. But the Blaster is also under a -50% debuff which is also (probably) a Cur. So the net is +22%. That is reduced to about +22% (negligable loss). Note: the buff and the debuff are summed and then DR is applied. As far as the game is concerned, those are both just attribmods: both buffs, just one negative. The game does not apply DR to buffs and debuffs individually. It only affects totals.


Rule Number Three: PvP DR is set individually per archetype, although most attributes work the same for most archetypes.

Nearly all Strength buffs obey the same DR curves for all archetypes. Most Resistance buffs obey the same DR curves with the exception of actual damage resistance. There are five different Resistance curves. Masterminds have the harshest, then the other squishies (Blasters, Controllers, Defenders, Corruptors, and Dominators), then HEATs and VEATs, then tankers, then the non-tanker melee (Scrappers, Brutes, Stalkers). For reference a 75% damage reistance buff would be DR reduced to 30% for MMs, 40% for the other squishes, 47% for EATs, 49% for Tankers, and 55% for the other melee archetypes. Most Cur DR curves are also similar, with the big exception being Cur defense buffs. There are three classes of Cur defense curves: the melee+VEAT curves, the HEAT curves, and the everyone else curves. For reference, a +40% defense buff is 18% for most classes, 26% for HEATs, and 30% for melee and VEATs.


To really apply DR, you need to know what powers actually do, so you know whether something is a Str, Cur, or Res buff - or none of the above. Here are the basics:

1. Essentially all standard enhancements are Strength buffs.
2. Any power that buffs you in such a way that another power gets stronger is a strength buff. Note the trick here: Build up buffs damage powers: the damage part is a Strength buff. But the tohit part just increases to hit, it doesn't, say, boost the effect of tactics. Its actually a Cur buff.
3. Self buffs that do not buff other powers, but buff the player directly are almost always Cur buffs (except for things like Max buffs).
4. Damage is basicaly always Abs (unaffected by DR directly - although damage Strength buffs are).
5. Heals are Abs.


Special case: Status protection and mez, including Knockback

Almost all power effects have two properties: a magnitude and a duration. Damage has a magnitude, but it typically does not have a duration - it has duration zero. Damage with a duration is not a DoT: damage with a duration is a continuously firing damage at the maximum speed the server can calculate damage - about eight times a second. Damage with a duration is generally a bug. Mez, on the other hand, tends to have meaningful magnitude and duration. Its important to note here that only *one* of those two properties can be changed for each effect per power. When you slot a hold for hold enhancement, the hold's duration gets longer. Its magnitude does not get higher. That's because all holds are designed so that the hold effect is *tagged* to be "Duration type." That means strength buffs affect duration, not magnitude. This is a binary switch: it can be set to "Magnitude" or "Duration" but not both. All effects in all powers must obey this rule: one property is frozen static, and one can theoretically be changed by buffs and debuffs, enhancements and other powers.

KB (and KU) are different from most mezzes. They are not designed to have duration, and buffs don't boost duration, they boost Magnitude. So while most holds are Duration-type effects, KB is a Magnitude-type effect. Buffing KB buffs its Magnitude. And KB is a Cur effect like most Mez and like most Mez protection.

Interesting note: you do not need to factor DR into mez magnitude to determine if something is mezzed. You only need to factor in mez strength in the attacker's mez power itself. The reason: Rule Two. DR only affects totals. If you have a mez protection power that is reducing Hold by mag 10, and and you have an incoming set of holds that are mag 9, the total is -10 + 9 = -1. DR might reduce that, but it will still be negative, which means you are still not mezzed. If the incoming hold total is +12, then the total is -10 + 12 = 2, and you're mezzed. DR might reduce the 2 to a lower value, but it will still be greater than zero. The only thing you have to factor in is if the attacker has mez strength capable of increasing the magnitude of the mez. The answer for most mezzes is usually "no." Enhancement and other buffs make holds last longer, not get higher mag. But the exception is KB: buffing a KB will buff its magnitude, so you do have to factor in KB strength into the attacker to determin the attacker's net KB, before adding to the target's KB magnitude protection.




For the mathematically inclined, here's the formula:

Final Value = Original Value * (1 - ABS(ATAN(A * Original Value) * 2/pi * B))
A and B are the tuning parameters set per attribute, per aspect, per archetype. To find the values for A and B, see the DR calculation sheet at this link: https://spreadsheets.google.com/ccc?...thkey=CPO10LgM

Use the two pulldowns to pick archetype and attribute, then enter values in the Normal value column for Strength, Cur, or Res. The calculated values show to the right. For reference, at the far right the sheet displays the A and B values for that attribute, that aspect, for the selected archetype.


For the mathematically disinclined, here's some tables with precalculated values. You can interpolate between values to get an estimate for other values:

Most Strength buffs including damage:

95%    80%
125%    100%
150%    115%
175%    128%
200%    141%
225%    152%
250%    162%
275%    172%
300%    181%
350%    197%
400%    212%
450%    226%
500%    239%

Base    A    B    C    D    MM
20%    17%    18%    18%    18%    16%
25%    20%    23%    22%    21%    18%
30%    23%    27%    26%    25%    21%
35%    26%    30%    29%    28%    22%
40%    29%    34%    32%    31%    24%
45%    31%    37%    35%    34%    25%
50%    33%    41%    38%    37%    27%
55%    35%    44%    40%    39%    28%
60%    36%    47%    43%    41%    29%
65%    38%    50%    45%    43%    29%
70%    39%    52%    47%    45%    30%
75%    40%    55%    49%    47%    30%
80%    41%    57%    51%    48%    31%
85%    42%    59%    53%    50%    31%
90%    43%    62%    54%    51%    32%

Base    A    B    H
10%    8%    9%    9%
15%    11%    14%    13%
20%    13%    18%    16%
25%    15%    21%    19%
30%    16%    24%    22%
35%    17%    28%    24%
40%    18%    30%    26%
45%    18%    33%    28%
50%    19%    35%    30%
60%    19%    40%    32%
70%    20%    43%    34%
80%    20%    46%    35%
90%    20%    48%    37%
100%    20%    50%    37%

10%    9%
15%    12%
20%    15%
25%    18%
30%    20%
35%    21%
40%    23%
45%    24%
50%    25%
60%    27%
70%    28%
80%    28%
90%    29%
100%    30%

Ty Arcana-

Next free transfers I will move something to triumph!

Thanks Arcanaville for the great overview.